Bernard Knight - Fear in the Forest

He stalked out, leaving his brother-in-law torn between anger and anxiety.

The next morning, John sat glumly in the Shire Hall waiting for the start of the regular County Court, a forum where a mixture of criminal and civil cases were mixed with petitions and a whole range of administrative affairs related to the running of the county of Devon.

Unable to sleep well, he had arrived too early and now sat contemplating the seemingly intractable problems in his personal life. The previous evening, after leaving the sheriff, he had gone down to the Bush, but it was not a successful visit. Nesta had been quiet and withdrawn and all his efforts to cheer her had failed. When he had asked her casually whether she had been out that day, Nesta had suddenly burst into tears and scrambled up to her room in the loft, intriguing many of the patrons, especially when they saw the King’s coroner follow her up the ladder. Her door was barred, and, in spite of his hissed demands to be let in, she continued to sob quietly on the other side. Defeated, he went back down, finished his ale and eventually, in gloomy confusion, trudged home, where he found Matilda back from her devotions. She was equally silent, though he sensed that for once her disgruntlement was not directed at him.

He was drawn out of his reverie by the arrival of the participants for the court hearings and tried to raise some interest in the proceedings.

On a low dais in the bare hall the sheriff sat centre-stage in a large chair, flanked by his chaplain, the rotund Brother Rufus on one side and the coroner on the other. They sat on the ends of two benches, which also carried Hugh de Relaga, one of the portreeves representing the burgesses of the city, John de Alençon, the Archdeacon of Exeter, on behalf of the cathedral, and several guildmasters and burgesses from Tavistock, Barnstaple and other towns in the county. Behind them, one man from each Hundred, the smaller divisions of the county, sat as a jury. The cases ranging from applications for fairs and licences for trading to allegations of assault and theft, were dealt with rapidly.

John was always doing his best to divert serious crimes into the royal courts, but many were still dealt with at this ancient county level. Two men were summarily sent to be hanged for confessed robbery with violence, in spite of John’s protests that they should be remanded to appear before the next Commissioners of Gaol Delivery, who were due to visit Exeter within a few months. The full majesty of the King’s Justices in Eyre had been in the city only a matter of weeks earlier and were unlikely to return for a couple of years, which gave the sheriff and burgesses a good excuse to ignore John’s argument that serious cases should only be handled by the royal courts.

As coroner — the ‘Keeper of the Pleas of the Crown’ — he did his best to implement Hubert Walter’s edict of the previous autumn, but it was hard work pushing against the old traditions, especially when the sheriff was violently opposed to anything that reduced his jurisdiction and his opportunity to extract more money from the population.

John had stood to present several cases already, fed to him by his clerk Thomas, who sat among the gaggle of secretaries and scribes on the benches at the back of the platform. When an approver or appealer was called, Thomas appeared behind de Wolfe and thrust a parchment into his hand. As he could not read, the little clerk whispered the content into his ear, a face-saving stratagem that was wasted on the literate sheriff, who watched the charade with a sardonic grin.

The main business of the court lasted two hours and, at the end, Philip de Strete was presented and stood smirking before the dais as the sheriff browbeat the court into unquestioning approval of his appointment as verderer. As John had no official standing in this matter, there was nothing he could say, even if he had had any grounds for objecting to the nomination. When the proceedings broke up for noon-time dinner, de Wolfe walked across the inner ward with his good friend, Archdeacon John de Alençon. The lean, ascetic clergyman, one of the senior canons of the cathedral chapter, asked him about Thomas de Peyne, his own nephew.

‘Is he proving satisfactory, John? The poor fellow has had a rough time these past few months.’

De Wolfe gave a rare lopsided grin. ‘Being almost hanged for murder after failing to kill himself was certainly a test for his soul! But he is an excellent clerk. His prowess with a quill pen is equalled only by his intelligence.’

The archdeacon nodded in approval. ‘He certainly seems more cheerful these days. Though I have little hope to offer him of a return to Holy Office in the near future.’

The coroner grunted his agreement. ‘I suspect he would have to move to some place far distant from either Winchester or Exeter. I know an influential churchman in Wales, Gerald de Barri, the Archdeacon of Brecon, who might help him. But to be honest, I am loath to lose Thomas, at least until I know that I could get someone half as reliable to replace him.’

The priest turned to de Wolfe, a smile lighting up his thin, lined face. ‘No, John, I don’t believe that such selfish motives would ever impede you, if you thought you could help my luckless nephew. Gerald de Barri, you say? Giraldus Cambrensis, a famous man in his own way, though a thorn in the flesh of Canterbury and even the Pope. No wonder you are friends, you are two peas from the same pod!’

They walked on in companionable silence, two figures both dressed sombrely, the one in a black cassock, the other in his grey tunic, until the archdeacon brought up a new subject.

‘I hear there is trouble in the forest — that verderer reminded me that one of the parish priests has voiced his concerns to me.’

‘Would that happen to be Father Amicus from Manaton?’

‘It was indeed — when he brought his tithe money in yesterday, he told me about the dead tanner and of the other problems in the forests.’

De Alencon stopped walking and ran a hand through his crinkled grey hair. He turned a worried face to the coroner.

‘I have heard through channels that need not be named that the old trouble may be stirring again, and I cannot but wonder if this unrest in the forest is related.’

De Wolfe rubbed the black stubble on his face.

‘You mean the old trouble involving our royal namesake? How can that be, what could he gain from it?’

They began walking again, down Castle Hill towards the high street.

‘More money, more influence, disruption of the existing order,’ replied the priest. John did not ask him where he had heard the rumour — it was a poorly kept secret that Bishop Henry Marshal, in common with some other senior churchmen, had been sympathetic to Prince John’s abortive rebellion when King Richard was imprisoned in Germany and not expected to survive. They walked on for a few more yards, then the archdeacon spoke again.

‘My duties these days are more administrative than pastoral or devotional,’ he said rather bitterly. ‘I meet many other priests from the diocese and hear many scraps of gossip and chatter.’

De Wolfe waited patiently; he sensed that his friend was gathering himself to tell him something that the secretive ecclesiastical community would rather keep to itself.

‘I heard a rumour not only that certain senior colleagues were dabbling again in sedition, but that some particular priest was actively engaged in furthering that ambition.’

They took a few more strides, which brought them into the hubbub of the main street, before the coroner pursued the matter.

‘Have you any idea as to his identity? You are not talking about one of the prime movers, I assume?’

He meant the bishop himself, but kept to their coded way of talking.